The  Spirit  Of  Black  Partridge 
SeeKiivg    Old    Fort    Dearborn 


Take  this  home  with  the  compliments  of 
Mayor  William  Hale  Thompson  as  a  souvenir 
of  a  pleasant  day  spent  as  his  guest  at  RiverviewPaik  U 


I~3: 


•BBWMMNMIB1 


LAWRENCE  J.  GUTTER 

Collection  of  Chicogoono 

THE    UNIVERSITY   OF   ILLINOIS 
AT  CHICAGO 

The  University  Library 


Old  and  The  JVezu 


Jhe  old  Illinois  Central  passenger  station  at  lake  Street 
in  1665,  showing  how  the  tracks-  were  first  built~ 
on  a.  trestle  work  out  in  the  £a£e. 


7he  proposed  new  Illinois  Central  passenger  depot  to  be, 

constructed  at  1%*!?  Street  and  South  Par\  Arenue 

vhich  has  been  built  up  from  the  beef  of  laJtg'Michiqar^.    '• 


Landmarks  of  Chicago 

One  hundred  years  ago,  or  within  the  lifetime  of  persons  yet 
living,  there  was  no  Chicago,  that  is,  there  was  no  settled  community 
of  that  name,  and  the  place  where  the  great  city  of  Chicago  now  stands 
was  a  wilderness,  save  only  for  a  lonely  fort  on  the  south  bank  oi 
the  river  and  a  few  rude  cabins  within  sight  of  the  fort. 

Go  back  another  hundred  years,  or  two  hundred  years  prior  to 
the  present  year  of  nineteen  hundred  and  twenty-two,  and  there  was 
even  less  in  the  way  of  evidence  that  civilization  had  touched  this 
locality.  At  that  time  travellers  passing  by  might  have  noted  what 
appeared  to  be  the  remains  of  an  old  fort  on  the  bank  of  the  river 
near  the  Lake,  and  paddling  their  canoes  up  the  sputh  branch  they 
might  have  noted  on  the  bank  of  the  river  a  few  miles  back  from  the 
Lake  the  dilapidated  remains  of  a  lowly  cabin  which  had  been  erected 
there  perhaps  forty  or  fifty  years  prior  to  that  time. 

THE  FIRST  VISIT  OF  FATHER  MARQUETTE 

On  a  day  late  in  the  summer  of  1673,  there  appeared  at  the  mouth 
of  the  river  a  few  white  men,  accompanied  by  a  number  of  Indians. 
They  beached  their  canoes  and  engaged  in  ceremonies  which  unmistak- 
ably were  those  of  leave-taking.  The  dominating  figure  of  the  party 
was  a  slender,  young  Frenchman  in  the  garb  of  a  Jesuit  priest.  Every 
act,  gesture  and  word  of  his  proclaimed  him  a  man  of  culture  and  re- 
finement, and  he  was  treated  with  the  utmost  deference  and  considera- 
tion by  every  man  in  the  party,  including  the  rough,  hardy  French  voy- 
ageurs  and  the  untutored  savages.  A  closer  look  at  this  scholarly  young 
churchman,  who  appeared  to  be  not  older  than  35,  disclosed  the  fact 
that  he  was  in  the  clutches  of  that  dread  malady,  tuberculosis,  or  con- 
sumption as  it  was  then  termed;  and  that  he  was  none  other  than 
Father  Jacques  Marquette,  accompanied  by  Louis  Joliet,  the  famous 
French  trader  and  explorer,  and  several  French  voyageurs,  returning  to 
Green  Bay  from  the  trip  on  which  they  had  just  explored  the  Mississippi 
river  as  far  south  as  the  mouth  of  the  Arkansas.  The  Indians  with 
them  were  of  the  Kaskaskia  tribe  of  the  Illinois  nation,  and  had  accom- 
panied the  exploring  party  up  the  Illinois  river  from  the  chief  village  of 
the  Kaskaskias.  When  the  party  again  put  their  canoes  into  the  water, 
the  white  men  turned  north  along  the  shore  of  the  Lake,  while  the  In- 
dians silently  and  sorrowfully  turned  their  canoes  up  the  river  toward 
the  southwest,  evidently  to  return  to  their  village  on  the  Illinois  river 
located  at  about  the  present  site  of  Utica. 

THE  FIRST  BUILDING  ON  SITE  OF  CHICAGO 

A  little  over  one  year  later,  early  in  December,  1674,  several 
canoes  approached  from  the  north  along  the  lake  shore  and  the  occu- 
pants landed  on  the  spct  where  they  had  landed  the  year  before.  It 
was  Father  Marquette  and  his  party  on  their  way  from  Green  Bay  back 
to  the  village  of  the  Kaskaskias.  On  account  of  the  severity  of  the 
weather,  they  had  been  several  weeks  coming  this  far,  and  when  they 


attempted  to  put  into  the  little  river  here,  they  found  it  covered  with 
six  inches  of  ice.  It  was  apparent  that  Father  Marquette  was  a  very 
sick  man;  too  sick,  in  fact,  to  continue  the  journey  in  that  bleak  and 
cold  winter.  What  was  to  be  done?  After  a  consultation  among  the 
party,  it  was  decided  to  build  a  hut  for  him  and  to  wait  until  he  got  able 
to  travel  again.  Accordingly,  a  detachment  of  the  party  followed  the 
course  of  the  river  inland  until  they  came  to  a  piece  of  high  ground 
covered  with  trees.  With  their  axes  they  made  a  clearing  and  felled 
enough  trees  to  build  a  log  cabin,  and  when  it  was  finished  they  ten- 
derly conveyed  the  sick  man  to  it.  That  was  the  first  habitation  built 
for  a  white  man  or  by  white  men  in  the  State  of  Illinois.  It  was  lo- 
cated on  the  north  bank  of  the  river  at  a  point  near  where  Robey 
Street,  if  extended,  would  cross  the  west  fork  of  the  south  branch  of 
the  Chicago  river.  This  historic  spot,  at  which  civilization  first  touched 
in  Illinois  and  in  the  Mississippi  valley,  is  now  marked  by  a  large 
cross  erected  there  by  Mr.  Cameron  Wylie,  in  1905,  at  the  request  of 
the  Chicago  Historical  Society. 

It  was  six  years  before  another  white  man  ventured  into  these 
solitudes,  when,  in  December,  1681,  a  number  of  canoes  entered  the 
mouth  of  the  river,  conveying  a  party  of  twenty-five  Frenchmen  and 
about  as  many  Indians.  The  party  was  led  by  the  Chevalier  Robert 
de  LaSalle  and  his  faithful  companion,  Henri  de  Tonti.  They  were 
on  their  way  to  explore  the  Mississippi  river  to  its  mouth.  They 
passed  the  lonely  cabin  erected  for  Father  Marquette,  crossed  the 
divide  between  the  Chicago  river  and  the  Desplaines  river,  placed  their 
canoes  in  the  latter  river  and  glided  down  to  the  Illinois,  on  to  the 
Mississippi,  and  on  and  on  until  they  came  to  the  salt  water  of  the 
Gulf  of  Mexico,  where,  at  the  mouth  of  the  great  Father  of  Waters, 
LaSalle,  on  April  9,  1682,  erected  a  cross,  planted  the  banner  of 
France,  claimed  all  of  the  territory  drained  by  the  great  river  for  the 
kingdom  of  France,  and  named  it  Louisiana  in  honor  of  the  reigning 
monarch,  King  Louis  XIV. 

UNNAMED  FRENCH  FORT  BUILT  HERE  IN   1682-3 

In  about  one  year  from  the  time  that  LaSalle  and  his  party  passed 
this  way  on  their  famous  voyage  of  discovery,  a  couple  of  canoes  came 
down  the  little  river  from  the  direction  in  which  LaSalle  had  departed, 
and  two  of  the  men  of  his  former  party  got  out.  After  a  brief  survey 
of  the  surroundings  they  marked  a  location  and  erected  a  small  fort 
with  heavy  logs  which  they  could  easily  drag  over  the  snow.  When 
it  was  completed  the  men  occupied  it  as  though  they  intended  to  make 
it  their  permanent  abiding  place,  but  they  hastened  away  a  few  months 
later  to  join  their  friends  at  Fort  St.  Louis  on  Starved  Rock.  This  little 
structure,  built  to  guard  the  portage  from  the  Chicago  river  to  the 
Desplaines,  although  in  itself  insignificant,  was  an  integral  part  of  a 
great  scheme  which  LaSalle  had  conceived  of  erecting  a  chain  of 
French  forts  to  extend  from  the  mouth  of  the  St.  Lawrence  river, 
around  the  Great  Lakes,  down  the  Illinois  and  Mississippi  rivers  to 
the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  thus  preparing  to  maintain  a  through  waterway 
from  the  Gulf  of  St.  Lawrence  to  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  and  to  defend 
the  claim  of  France  to  all  the  vast  territory  which  these  forts  would 
guard.  One  of  these  forts,  named  Fort  St.  Louis,  in  honor  of  the  King, 
was  erected  on  the  top  of  Starved  Rock  on  the  Illinois  river.  That  was 
the  temporary  headquarters  of  LaSalle,  and  it  was  from  that  fort  that 
he  sent  a  detachment  late  in  1682  or  early  in  1683  to  build  the  little 
fort  here  at  the  mouth  of  the  river. 


HOW  CHICAGO  GOT  ITS  NAME 

The  locality  in  the  immediate  neighborhood  of  the  fort  was  low 
and  swampy,  and  the  most  common  vegetation  of  the  vicinity  was  the 
wild  onion,  •which,  at  certain  seasons  of  the  year,  gave  forth  a  rank 
and  putrid  odor.  There  is  no  definite  proof  that  the  little  river  or  the 
locality  were  at  that  time  considered  important  enough  to  have  a  name 
to  designate  them,  but  since  our  city  has  become  world  famous,  the 
claim  has  been  advanced  that  our  name  Chicago  was  derived  from  an 
Indian  word  meaning  "a  bad  smell,"  perpetuating  the  memory  of  the 
wild  onions.  Another  tradition  is  to  the  effect  that  the  name  was 
derived  from  a  similar  Indian  word  signifying  a  man  particularly  brave 
and  strong.  This  theory  is  supported  by  the  fact  that  there  was  a 
Chief  of  the  Illinois  Indians  named  Chicago,  but  it  is  probable  that 
he  was  named  after  the  locality. 

Another  account  of  how  Chicago  got  its  name,  which  is  more  logi- 
cal if  true,  and  vastly  more  acceptable,  will  be  found  in  the  Remini- 
scences of  Early  Chicago,  by  Edwin  O.  Gale,  in  which  he  quotes  from 
a  letter  which  the  Chevalier,  Robert  de  LaSalle,  is  supposed  to  have 
written  back  to  a  friend  in  France  concerning  LaSalle's  explorations  in 
this  vicinity.  Unfortunately,  the  letter  referred  to  cannot  be  located, 
but  it  was  quoted  by  Mr.  Gale  as  follows: 

"After  many  toils  I  came  to'  the  head  of  the  great  Lake  and  rested 
for  some  days  on  the  bank  of  a  river,  of  feeble  current,  now  flowing 
into  the  lake,  but  which  occupies  the  course  that  formerly  the  waters 
of  these  great  lakes  took  as  they  flowed  southward  to  the  Mississippi 
river.  This  is  the  lowest  point  on  the  divide  between  the  two  great 
valleys  of  the  St.  Lawrence  and  the  Mississippi.  The  boundless  regions 
of  the  west  must  send  their  products  to  the  east  through  this  point. 
This  will  be  the  gate  of  empire,  this  the  seat  of  commerce.  Every- 
thing invites  to  action.  The  typical  man  who  will  grow  up  here  must  be 
an  enterprising  man.  Each  day  as  he  rises  he  will  exclaim,  '1  act,  I  move 
I  push,'  and  there  will  be  spread  before  him  a  boundless  horizon  and 
illimitable  field  of  activity.  A  limitless  expanse  of  plain  is  here — to 
the  east  water  and  at  all  other  points  land.  If  I  were  to  give  this 
place  a  name,  1  would  derive  it  from  the  nature  of  the  place  and  the 
nature  of  the  man  who  will  occupy  this  place;  ago,  I  act;  circum,  all 
round — Circago."  .  . 

Those  who  maintain  that  LaSalle  thus  gave  us  our  name  explain 
that  the  Indians  who  heard  it  from  his  lips,  not  being  able  to  pronounce 
it  in  its  original  Latin  form,  rendered  it  as  it  might  nearest  sound  in 
their  own  language,  She-cau-go,  and  that  it  was  finally  settled  into  its 
present  form,  Chicago.  So  far  as  the  writer  has  been  able  to  ascer- 
tain there  was  no  mention  of  Che-cau-gau,  under  that  or  any  similar 
name,  prior  to  the  first  visit  of  LaSalle  to  this  vicinity.  Its  first  men- 
tion occured  in  Father  Hennepin's  account  of  LaSalle's  expedition  to 
the  Illinois  river  in  1680.  This  fact  lends  color  to  the  theory  that 
the  Indians  had  adopted  LaSalle's  name  for  the  locality;  and  this 
theory  is  further  strengthened  by  the  fact  that  those  versed  in  Indian 
lore  and  language  cannot  agree  as  to  the  Indian  origin  of  the  name 
nor  as  to  its  meaning. 

WARRING  INDIAN  NATIONS  DELAY  WHITE  SETTLEMENT 

The  building  of  the  little  hut  for  Father  Marquette  and  the  erection 
of  the  unpretentious  fort  near  the  mouth  of  the  Chicago  river  con- 
stituted the  only  improvements  or  additions  to  the  landscape  made  by 
the  early  French  explorers,  and  in  the  course  of  the  years  following 
these  fell  into  rapid  decay  through  disuse.  Another  hundred  years 
were  to  pass  before  any  attempt  would  be  made  permanently  to  settle 
the  plain  around  the  mouth  of  the  Chicago  river.  Although  all  the 
trails  of  discovery  and  exploration  were  from  the  north,  yet  permanent 


•ettlements  were  made  in  southern  Illinois  a  full  century  before  they 
were  here.  This  was  a  result  of  feuds  and  conflicts  between  the  differ- 
ent Indian  tribes  and  nations.  The  valley  of  the  Illinois  river  was 
inhabited  by  tribes  of  the  Illinois  Indians  when  it  was  first  visited  by 
Marquette  and  Joliet.  In  fact,  it  was  this  circumstance  which  gave  the 
river  its  name.  Away  to  the  east,  there  dwelt  a  savage,  war-like 
aggregation  of  Indians  called  the  Iroquois.  They  were  unrelenting 
foes  of  the  Illinois,  and  would  swoop  down  on  the  latter  from  time 
to  time,  until  the  Illinois  were  threatened  -with  extinction.  And  so  it 
was  that  the  early  French  explorers  were  welcomed  to  the  Illinois 
country  because  the  Indians  here  saw  in  them  powerful  protectors 
against  the  dreaded  raids  of  the  Iroquois;  and  it  was  to  protect  the 
friendly  Illinois  that  LaSalle  erected  Fort  Crevecoeur,  near  the  present 
site  of  Peoria,  in  1679,  and  Fort  St.  Louis  on  Starved  Rock  late  in 
the  year  1682. 

These  unsuccessful  attempts  to  establish  settlements  on  the  northern 
Illinois  river  were  abandoned  about  1  700,  and  the  settlements  moved  to 
southern  Illinois,  the  first  of  which  was  established  at  Kaskaskia,  which 
later  became  the  first  capital  of  Illinois. 

CAHOKIA  COURTHOUSE,   200  YEARS  OLD,  NOW 
IN  JACKSON  PARK 

Cahokia  was  the  second  permanent  French  settlement  established 
in  Illinois,  and  was  named  for  the  Cahokia  Indians,  a  tribe  of  the 
Illinois  nation  which  dwelt  in  that  vicinity.  It  was  at  Cahokia,  in  1716, 
that  the  first  public  building  -was  erected.  It  was  used  as  a  courthouse, 
a  schoolhouse,  and  for  other  public  purposes.  It  was  brought  to  Chi- 
cago, in  November,  1906,  and  erected  on  its  present  location  by  the 
Chicago  Historical  Society,  where  it  may  be  seen  now  on  the  Wooded 
Island  in  Jackson  Park,  just  as  it  stood  in  old  Cahokia  two  hundred  years 
ago. 

With  the  abandonment  of  Fort  St.  Louis  on  Starved  Rock  in  I  722 
the  Chicago  portage  was  abandoned,  and  thereafter  for  about  a  hundred 
years  commerce  between  the  Great  Lakes  and  the  Mississippi  river  valley 
was  by  way  of  the  Maumee  River  to  the  present  site  of  Fort  Wayne, 
Indiana,  thence  overland  to  the  present  site  of  LaFayette,  Indiana, 
thence  down  the  Wabash  into  the  Ohio  and  on  to  the  Mississippi. 

"FIRST  'WHITE*  SETTLER  IN  CHICAGO  WAS  A  NEGRO" 

After  the  removal  of  the  French  to  southern  Illinois  about  1700, 
nothing  worthy  of  note  seems  to  have  happened  at  the  Chicago  river 
until  July  4,  1779,  on  which  date  the  British  commander  at  Mackinac 
recorded  the  fact  that  "Baptiste  Point  de  Saible,  a  handsome  negro, 
well  educated,  settled  at  Eschikagou,  and  is  much  in  the  French  inter- 
est." De  Saible  was  a  native  of  Santo  Domingo.  His  name  being  un- 
doubtedly of  French  origin,  considered  in  connection  with  the  meager 
details  of  his  biography,  suggests  that  his  father  was  a  French  trader 
and  adventurer  and  his  mother  a  native  negress  of  Santo  Domingo. 
His  cabin  was  on  the  north  bank  of  the  Chicago  river  near  the  north 
end  of  the  present  Michigan  Avenue  bridge.  In  1  796,  De  Saible  sold 
his  cabin  to  a  French  trader,  Pierre  Le  Mai  (one  of  four  who  settled 
here  temporarily  at  the  time),  and  returned  to  Peoria,  where  he  died 
soon  after.  Thus  it  happened,  as  has  been  humorously  stated,  that 
"the  first  white  settler  in  Chicago  was  a  negro." 


THIS  LOCALITY  DESIGNATED  SITE  FOR  FORT 

When  the  government  of  the  United  States,  under  the  Constitution, 
was  established  in  1  789,  steps  were  taken  immediately  to  establish  civil 
government  in  the  territory  northwest  of  the  Ohio  River.  As  might 
be  expected,  trouble  developed  between  the  new  settlers  and  the  Indians 
who  occupied  this  territory.  A  military  expedition  led  by  General  An- 
thony Wayne  of  revolutionary  fame  awed  the  Indians  into  apparent 
submission.  In  August,  1795,  at  Greenville,  Ohio,  a  treaty  was  made 
between  General  Wayne  and  certain  Indian  chiefs  who  were  supposed 
to  represent  and  speak  for  all  the  Indians  in  the  territory  northwest  of 
the  Ohio  River.  This  original  treaty  of  Greenville  is  now  in  the  pos- 
session of  the  Chicago  Historical  Society.  Under  it  the  United  States 
acquired  title  to  several  pieces  and  parcels  of  land  in  different  parts  of 
the  territory  to  be  used  for  the  purpose  of  establishing  military  posts. 
One  of  these  pieces  was  described  as  follows:  "One  piece  of  land  six 
miles  square  at  the  mouth  of  the  Chicago  River,  emptying  into  the 
southwest  end  of  Lake  Michigan  where  a  fort  formerly  stood."  (This 
reference  is  to  the  Fort  erected  in  1683  by  two  men  of  LaSalle's  party 
sent  from  Fort  St.  Louis.) 

FORT  DEARBORN  ERECTED  IN   1803-4 

In  accordance  with  the  provisions  of  the  Treaty  of  Greenville,  a 
fort  was  erected  in  1803-4  near  the  mouth  of  the  Chicago  River  by  a 
company  of  United  States  soldiers  under  command  of  Captain  John 
Whistler,  and  was  named  Fort  Dearborn  in  honor  of  General  Henry 
Dearborn,  a  soldier  of  the  Revolutionary  War,  then  Secretary  of  War 
in  the  cabinet  of  President  Thomas  Jefferson.  At  the  time  Fort  Dear- 
born was  erected  there  was  but  one  building  in  this  vicinity,  and  that 
was  the  old  cabin  of  Jean  Baptiste  Point  de  Saible,  occupied  at  that 
time  by  the  French  trader,  Pierre  Le  Mai,  and  his  Indian  wife. 

With  the  erection  of  the  fort,  and  the  assurance  of  protection  which 
it  seemed  to  guarantee,  came  the  vanguard  of  the  immigrants,  who,  in 
another  generation  were  to  settle  the  Chicago  portage.  In  1 804,  the 
year  in  which  the  fort  was  completed,  appeared  the  first  permanent 
white  settler,  John  Kinzie,  with  his  family.  Kinzie  bought  the  cabin 
of  Pierre  Le  Mai  which  had  been  originally  occupied  by  Jean  Baptiste 
Pointe  de  Saible.  Soon  after  their  arrival  the  Kinzie  fireside  was  aug- 
mented by  the  addition  of  a  daughter,  Ellen  Marion  Kinzie,  the  first 
•white  child  born  on  the  site  of  our  city. 

At  the  time  the  fort  was  built  there  was  nothing  to  attract  settlers 
except  the  opportunity  the  place  afforded  for  trade  with  the  Indians. 
This  is  indicated  by  the  fact  that  an  Indian  trading  post  was  erected 
outside  the  palisades  of  the  fort  and  some  distance  west  of  it,  at  about 
the  present  intersection  of  Clark  and  Lake  Streets.  This  trading  post 
was  purposely  removed  from  the  fort  because  it  was  not  thought  wise 
to  allow  the  Indians  inside  the  fortification. 

INDIANS  ENLISTED  IN  WAR  ON  COLONISTS 

As  we  have  seen,  the  Indians  were  on  very  friendly  terms  with  the 
French,  and  generally  fought  on  the  side  of  the  French  in  any  alter- 
cations between  the  French  and  the  English.  The  Indians  also  resented 
the  introduction  of  agriculture  by  the  English  colonists  because  it  threat- 
ened destruction  of  their  vast  huating  grounds.  After  the  French  had 
been  driven  out,  about  1  760,  the  British  took  advantage  of  the  hostile 
attitude  of  the  Indians  toward  the  colonists  in  order  to  array  the  Indians 
against  them.  In  pursuance  of  this  policy,  the  British  government  for- 
bade the  colonists  from  settling  around  the  Great  Lakes  or  in  the 


Mississippi    valley,    thinking    in    this   way    to    gain    the    friendship    c»'   the 
Indians  and  to  make  an  alliance  with  them  against  the  colonists. 

During  the  Revolutionary  War,  British  commanders  sought  to  per- 
petuate the  strife  between  the  white  settlers  and  the  natives  by  em- 
ploying the  Indians  to  raid  the  white  settlements,  paying  them  bounties 
for  the  scalps  of  white  settlers;  and  the  hatred  thus  engendered  among 
the  Indians  by  the  mother  country  c.£  inst  her  own  children  naturally 
outlasted  the  Revolutionary  War;  in  fact,  the  resentment  thus  created 
lasted  as  long  as  the  Indian  race. 

BRITISH  RUTHLESSNESS  CONDEMNED  BY  PRESIDENT   MADISON 

The  American  people  were  compelled  to  engage  in  another  war 
against  Great  Britain  in  1812,  in  order  to  prevent  England  from  des- 
troying our  commerce  on  the  high  seas.  One  of  the  war  measures 
adopted  by  Great  Britain  was  to  instigate  the  Indians  to  organize  raids 
against  the  settlements- of  the  colonists.  President  James  Madison,  in 
his  fourth  annual  message  to  Congress,  referred  to  this  practice  of 
Great  Britain  in  these  words: 

"Whilst  the  beneficent  policy  of  the  United  States  invariably  recom- 
mended peace  and  promoted  civilization  among  that  wretched  portion 
of  the  human  race  (Indian),  and  was  making  exertions  to  dissuade  them 
from  taking  either  side  in  the  war,  the  enemy  has  not  scrupled  to  call 
to1  his  aid  their  ruthless  ferocity,  armed  with  the  horrors  of  those 
instruments  of  carnage  and  torture  which  are  known  to  spare  neither 
age  nor  sex.  In  this  outrage  against  the  laws  of  honorable  war  and 
against  the  feelings  sacred  to  humanity,  the  British  commanders  can- 
not resort  to  a  plea  of  retaliation,  for  it  is  committed  in  the  face  of 
our  example.  They  cannot  mitigate  it  by  calling  it  a  self  defense 
against  men  in  arms  for  it  embraces  the  most  shocking  butcheries 
of  defenseless  families." 

On  account  of  its  remoteness  the  English  were  able  to  capture  Fort 
Mackinac  on  Mackinac  Island  in  the  straits  between  Lake  Michigan 
and  Lake  Huron,  and  from  this  point  they  directed  the  Indian  hos- 
tilities on  this  western  frontier,  including  the  lonely  little  outpost  at 
Fort  Dearborn. 

THE  FORT  DEARBORN  MASSACRE  IN  1812 

In  the  summer  of  1812  Fort  Dearborn  contained  a  garrison  of 
fifty-eight  officers  and  soldiers.  Some  of  these  men  had  their  families 
with  them,  numbering  altogether  twelve  women  and  twenty  children. 
Aside  from  the  fort  and  the  Indian  trading  post,  there  were  only  five 
buildings  in  this  vicinity,  one  being  the  home  of  John  Kinzie,  just 
across  the  river  from  the  fort.  The  four  other  cabins  were  occupied 
by  white  settlers,  named  Lee,  White,  Burns  and  Ouilmette  (pronounced 
Will-met),  for  whom  the  city  of  Wilmette  was  named. 

Thus  in  early  August,  1812,  this  little  aggregation  of  pioneers 
found  themselves  on  the  far  western  frontier  of  America,  surrounded 
by  hundreds  of  hostile  Indian  warriors,  whose  savage  inclinations  were 
being  encouraged  by  British  officers,  and  who  were  only  waiting  the 
opportunity  and  the  word  to  attack.  Under  these  circumstances,  the 
commandant  of  the  fort,  Captain  Nathan  Heald,  received  an  order  from 
General  Hull,  stationed  at  Detroit,  in  supreme  command  of  all  the 
American  forces  in  Michigan,  Indiana  and  Illinois,  "to  evacuate  the 
fort  at  Chicago  if  practicable,  and  in  that  event  to  distribute  all  the 
United  States  property  in  the  fort,  or  factory,  to  the  Indians  in  the 
neighborhood  and  repair  to  Fort  Wayne." 

Captain  Heald  insisted  upon  obeying  these  orders,  although  the 
judgment  of  the  other  officers  was  against  the  move,  regarding  it  as 
foolish  to  trust  the  little  garrison  to  the  mercy  of  the  restless,  vindic- 
tive savages.  While  the  question  was  being  debated,  Captain  William 
Wells,  an  uncle  of  Mrs.  Heald,  arrived  from  Fort  Wayne,  with  a  band 

6 


of  friendly  Miami  Indians,  to  urge  Captain  Heald  to  hold  Fort  Dear- 
born until  re-enforcements  could  be  secured.  Contrary  to  all  this 
advice  and  counsel,  Captain  Heald  determined  to  follow  the  instructions 
from  General  Hull,  and  accordingly  called  a  council  of  the  Indians  then 
in  the  neighborhood  of  the  fort  and  offered  to  evacuate  the  fort  and 
distribute  the  stores  among  them  if  they  would  furnish  a  safe  escort 
for  the  garrison  to  Fort  Wayne.  This  they  promised  to  do. 

HEROIC  POSITION  TAKEN  BY  BLACK  PARTRIDGE 

Among  the  stores  was  a  large  quantity  of  ammunition  and  many 
barrels  of  whisky,  the  principal  articles  of  trade  with  the  Indians.  The 
junior  officers  of  the  fort,  realizing  what  a  bad  combination  fire  arms 
and  "firewater"  would  make  with  the  Indians,  prevailed  upon  Captain 
Heald  not  to  do  this,  so  the  ammunition  was  thrown  into  an  old  well 
and  the  whisky  into  the  river.  This  made  the  Indians  furious,  notice 
of  which  was  brought  to  Captain  Heald  by  Black  Partridge,  a  Potta- 
wattomie  chief  who  was  present  at  the  signing  of  the  treaty  of  Green- 
ville with  General  ("Mad")  Anthony  Wayne.  Black  Partridge  had 
afterward  received  a  medal  from  the  United  States  government  on 
account  of  his  friendly  attitude  at  that  time.  He  now  stated  to  Cap- 
tain Heald: 

"Father,  I  come  to  deliver  up  to  you  the  medal  I  wear.  It  was 
given  me  by  the  Americans  and  I  have  worn  it  in  token  of  our  mutual 
friendship.  But  our  young  men  are  resolved  to  imbrue  their  hands  in 
the  blood  of  the  whites.  I  cannot  restrain  them  and  will  not  wear  a 
token  of  peace  while  I  am  obliged  to  act  as  an  enemy." 

In  spite  of  this  solemn  warning,  on  the  morning  of  August  1 5, 
Captain  Heald  marched  his  little  garrison  out  of  the  fort  in  martial 
array,  accompanied  by  Captain  Wells  and  his  band  of  friendly  Indians, 
and  started  south  along  the  shore  of  the  lake  on  the  way  to  Fort  Wayne. 
They  had  travelled  but  about  a  mile  and  a  half  when  they  were  attacked 
by  the  Indians.  In  a  few  minutes,  more  than  half  of  the  troops  were 
killed  and  the  remainder  surrendered.  Then  the  Indians  wreaked  their 
vengeance  on  the  helpless  women  and  children,  one  young  "brave" 
murdering  twelve  of  the  children.  Mrs.  Helm,  daughter  of  John  Kinzie 
and  wife  of  Lieutenant  Helm,  was  attacked  by  another  "brave,"  but 
she  was  rescued  by  the  timely  interference  and  aid  of  Black  Partridge, 
who  exposed  himself  to  the  wrath  of  the  infuriated  warriors  in  order 
to  save  her.  Among  those  killed  was  Captain  Wells,  who  fought  vali- 
antly until  he  was  stabbed  in  the  back  by  an  Indian  warrior.  Wells 
street  in  our  city  was  named  for  him.  Those  who  were  not  killed  were 
distributed  among  the  different  tribes  as  hostages  and  were  later 
rescued. 

This  brutal  massacre  is  supposed  to  have  occurred  at  a  point  about 
where  I  8th  street,  if  extended  eastward,  would  cross  the  Illinois  Central 
Railway.  Near  this  point,  at  the  foot  of  18th  street,  is  a  landmark  of 
Chicago  in  the  form  of  a  beautiful  bronze  monument  representing  Black 
Partridge  saving  the  life  of  Mrs.  Helm. 

SITE  OF  OLD  FORT  DEARBORN 

If  the  reader  will  now  turn  to  the  picture  on  the  front  cover  of  this 
little  booklet  he  will  note  a  tall  building  at  each  end  of  the  bridge  in  the 
middle  distance.  The  bridge  is  the  Michigan  Avenue  bridge  and  is 
the  link  between  the  north  side  and  the  south  side  boulevard  systems. 
The  tall  building  to  be  erected  at  the  left  or  the  south  end  of  the 
bridge  will  stand  on  the  site  of  old  Fort  Dearborn.  The  building  at 
the  right  or  the  north  end  of  the  bridge  is  about  on  the  location  of  the 
old  home  occupied  in  turn  by  De  Saible,  Le  Mai  and  John  Kinzie.  The 


story  of  old  Fort  Dearborn  was  brielly  told  on  the  memorial  tablet  in 
the  building  which  until  recently  occupied  the  site  and  which  read 
as  follows: 

"This  building  occupies  the  site  of  old  Fort  Dearborn,  which  ex- 
tended a  little  across  Mich.  Ave.,  and  somewhat  into  the  river  as  it 
now  is.  The  fort  was  built  in  1803  and  4,  forming  our  utmost  defense. 
By  order  of  Gen.  Hull  it  was  evacuated  Aug.  15,  1812,  after  its  stores 
and  provisions  had  been  distributed  among  the  Indians.  Very  soon 
after  the  Indians  attacked  and  massacred  about  fifty  o'f  the  troops  and 
a  number  of  citizens,  including  women  and  children  and  next  day 
burned  the  fort.  In  1816  it  was  rebuilt,  but  after  the  Black  Hawk 
War  it  went  into  gradual  disuse,  and  in  May  1837  was  abandoned  by 
the  army,  but  was.  occupied  by  various  government  officers  till  1857, 
when  it  was  torn  down,  excepting  a  single  building,  which  stood  upon 
this  site  till  the  great  fire  of  Oct.  9,  1871.  At  the  suggestion  of  the 
Chicago  Historical  So'ciety  this'  tablet  was  erected  by  W.  M.  Hoyt, 
Nov.,  1880." 

It  is  assumed  that  the  old  tablet  or  some  other  suitable  marker  will 
be  conspicuously  displayed  in  the  new  building  to  be  erected  on  the 
site  and  thus  preserve  one  of  the  early  landmarks  of  Chicago. 

The  Fort  Dearborn  massacre  in  1812  first  invited  national  attention 
to  this  locality.  Its  importance  as  a  future  commercial  center  had  been 
recognized  by  the  French  beginning  with  Marquette  and  Joliet;  but  on 
account  of  .the  almost  continuous,  destructive  conflicts  involving  it,  first 
among  the  Indians,  then  between  the  French  and  English,  then  between 
the  English  and  the  American  colonists,  and  lastly  between  the  first 
settlers  and  the  Indians,  there  had  been  no  time  when  the  location  ap- 
pealed to  sober-minded  settlers  as  a  place  to  establish  a  permanent 
home  or  to  engage  in  peaceful  commerce. 

HOW  CHICAGO  WAS  LOCATED  IN  ILLINOIS 

Prior  to  the  admission  of  Illinois  as  a  state,  it  was  not  known,  and 
few  seemed  to  care,  whether  the  territory  in  which  Chicago  is  situated 
•would  be  a  part  of  Wisconsin  or  Illinois,  but  the  surveys  up  to  that 
time  indicated  it  as  properly  a  part  of  Wisconsin,  the  northern  bound- 
ary of  Illinois  being  a  line  drawn  from  the  extreme  south  end  of  Lake 
Michigan  straight  west  to  the  Mississippi  river.  When  Illinois  was  ad- 
mitted into  the  Union  as  a  state,  in  1818,  our  territorial  Representative 
in  Congress,  Judge  Nathanial  Pope  of  Kaskaskia,  had  the  resolution 
of  admittance  amended  so  that  the  boundary  was  placed  at  its  present 
location.  This  act  saved  the  port  of  Chicago  and  sixteen  of  our  richest 
counties  to  the  State  of  Illinois;  and  it  was  from  one  of  these  counties 
that  General  Grant  enlisted  in  the  Civil  War. 

CAUSES  LEADING  TO  DEVELOPMENT  HERE 

A  situation  involving  the  Chicago  portage  was  now  presented  which 
was  radically  different  from  previous  circumstances  and  conditions. 
Prior  to  1803  the  territory  west  of  the  Mississippi  was  foreign  territory, 
belonging  to  France;  but  in  the  same  year  in  which  the  building  of 
Fort  Dearborn  was  begun,  France  ceded  all  of  that  vast  territory  to 
the  United  States,  in  that  way  extending  our  frontier  from  the  Missis- 
sippi River  to  the  .Rocky  Mountains  and  annexing  to  our  national  do- 
main one  of  the  most  fertile  agricultural  valleys  of  the  whole  world. 
It  became  evident  immediately  that  it  would  not  be  long  before  the 
products  of  that  region  would  be  seeking  routes  to  the  eastern  sea- 
board, which  was  the  only  market  available  at  that  time.  That  started 
inquiry  as  to  the  best  and  most  convenient  water  routes. 

Then  the  calamity  at  old  Fort  Dearborn  called  attention  to  the 
Chicago  portage,  and  the  prophetic  words  of  Marquette,  Joliet,  La- 
Salle,  Tonti,  Hennepin  and  other  of  the  early  explorers  were  recalled, 
to  the  effect  that  this  is  the  lowest  point  on  the  divide  between  the 


valleys  of  the  St.  Lawrence  and  Mississippi  rivers,  and  that  a  canal 
could  be  constructed  here  to  connect  the  Great  Lakes  and  the  Missis- 
sippi with  less  effort  than  at  any  other  place. 

The  immediate  future  need  and  feasibility  of  such  a  canal  was 
made  apparent  by  the  building  of  the  Erie  Canal  350  miles  through 
the  State  of  New  York  from  Lake  Erie  to  the  Hudson  river  to  provide 
a  waterway  from  the  Great  Lakes  to  the  Atlantic  Ocean.  With  that 
canal  in  course  of  construction  (it  was  completed  in  1825),  public 
interest  naturally  was  attracted  to  a  canal  project  to  make  a  waterway 
connection  between  the  Great  Lakes  and  the  Mississippi  river  system, 
thus  providing  a  through  water  route  from  the  agricultural  lands  of 
the  Mississippi  valley  to  the  Atlantic  Ocean. 

EARLY  WATERWAY  PROJECT  TO  UNITE  LAKE  AND  RIVERS 

Therefore,  it  was  only  natural  when  Illinois  came  into  the  Union, 
in  1818,  that  our  first  governor,  Shadrach  Bond,  in  his  first  message 
to  the  Illinois  legislature  should  point  out  the  necessity  for  the  con- 
struction of  a  waterway  to  join  Lake  Michigan  and  the  Illinois  River. 
It  was  more  necessary  at  that  time  than  those  of  the  present  day  can 
appreciate,  because  there  were  then  no  railroads  in  the  State  of  Illinois, 
and  all  commerce  worthy  of  the  name  was  carried  on  the  waterways. 
Governor  Coles,  who  succeeded  Governor  Bond,  also  strongly  urged 
immediate  construction  of  the  canal,  with  the  result  that  the  Legislature 
appointed  a  board  of  commissioners  to  ascertain  what  the  project  would 
cost,  with  instructions  to  report  to  the  next  legislature. 

After  considering  this  report,  the  Legislature  in  1825  authorized 
the  incorporation  of  the  "Illinois  and  Michigan  Canal  Association," 
patterned  after  the  New  York  canal  corporation,  which  was  to  com- 
plete the  canal  within  ten  years.  Daniel  P.  Cook,  for  whom  Cook 
County  was  named  and  who  was  then  sole  member  of  the  lower  house 
of  Congress  from  Illinois,  vigorously  opposed  the  plan  of  allowing  a 
private  corporation  to  build  the  canal,  on  the  ground  that  the  rich 
harvest  in  revenue  which  it  was  destined  to  yield  should  go  into  the 
State  Treasury.  Cook  enthusiastically  predicted  "that  in  less  than 
thirty  years  it  would  relieve  the  people  from  payment  of  taxes  and 
even  leave  a  surplus  to  be  applied  to  other  work  of  public  utilities." 
Not  being  content  to  stop  with  mere  opposition  to  the  State  plan,  he 
placed  Chicago  and  Illinois  under  everlasting  obligation  to  him  by 
securing  the  enactment  by  the  Congress  of  the  United  States  of  the 
Act  of  March  9,  1827,  granting  to  the  State  of  Illinois  "for  the  pur- 
pose of  aiding  her  in  opening  a  canal  to  connect  the  waters  of  the 
Illinois  River  with  those  of  Lake  Michigan,"  some  two  hundred  thou- 
sand acres  of  land  to  be  used  by  the  State  Legislature  to  help  pay  the 
cost  of  construction. 

FULFILLING  THE  PROPHECY  OF  FATHER  MARQUETTE 

In  1829  the  General  Assembly  enacted  legislation  looking  to  the 
organization  of  a  new  Board  of  Canal  Commissioners  "to  explore, 
examine,  fix  and  determine  the  route  of  the  canal,"  and  to  provide 
for  financing  the  undertaking  by  the  sale  of  land  out  of  that  donated 
by  the  Federal  Government.  Under  the  authority  of  this  legislation 
surveyors  began  work  immediately  to  lay  out  the  canal,  which  was 
projected  to  extend  from  the  level  of  Lake  Michigan,  over  the  low 
divide  between  the  Lake  and  the  DesPlaines  river,  approximately  1 00 
miles  in  a  southwesterly  direction  to  the  head  of  navigation  in  the 
Illinois  river  at  about  the  present  site  of  LaSalle.  The  canal  at  this 
end  joined  the  Chicago  river  at  a  point  within  sight  of  the  location  of 
the  cabin  in  which  Father  Marquette  spent  the  winter  of  1674-5.  Thus 


T 


/Tie  cf^t/i/me . . 

from  H?c6  T?OH>,  fft  a£out  tfre present /ocafcon. 


it  appeared  in  /66S.  with  JLa£e.  tSficfayan.  impinging 

an  J7/mot<s  Central  fr<fin  fearing  trie.   oM '  depct  ot 
-La£e  cftceet 


- 

famous  ..r&t/hne 

\    Wonderfu 


by  a  striking  coincidence  his  lonely  cabin  was  located  at  the  head  of 
the  canal  he  had  advocated,  and  after  a  lapse  of  more  than  !50  years 
his  dream  of  a  waterway  to  connect  the  Illinois  river  and  Lake  Mi',  hi- 
gt.n  became  a  reality. 

It  is  only  natural  that  settlements  should  spring  up  immediately  at 
the  termini  of  the  canal.  Already  the  Erie  canal  in  New  York  was  a 
great  commercial  success,  and  the  shrewd  "Yankees"  of  New  York  and 
New  England  could  foresee  a  rapid  development  here  as  a  result  of 
the  construction  of  the  Illinois  and  Michigan  Canal.  This  accounts 
for  the  fact  that  Chicago  was  settled  by  eastern  people,  whereas 
southern  Illinois  was  settled  largely  from  the  south. 

JAMES  THOMPSON  SURVEYS  SITE  OF  CHICAGO  IN   1830 

One  of  the  surveyors  who  worked  on  the  survey  of  the  canal  was 
James  Thompson  of  old  Kaskaskia,  and  it  fell  to  his  lot  to  make  the 
original  survey  of  the  site  of  Chicago.  That  survey,  dated  August  4, 
1830,  showed  the  boundaries  of  Chicago  to  be  Kinzie  street  on  the 
north,  Madison  street  on  the  south,  State  street  on  the  east,  and  Des 
Plaines  street  on  the  west,  in  all  less  than  half  a  square  mile  of  terri- 
tory. After  surveying  the  site  of  Chicago,  James  Thompson  returned 
to  his  home  in  Kaskaskia  and  there  completed  a  very  useful  life,  being 
one  of  a  very  few  men  who  were  actively  engaged  in  the  development 
of  both  southern  Illinois  and  the  northern  portion  of  the  state.  After 
his  death  in  1872  his  remains  lay  for  forty-five  years  in  an  unmarked 
grave  in  old  Preston  cemetery  in  Randolph  County,  not  far  from  Kas- 
kaskia. This  coming  to  the  attention  of  Mayor  William  Hale  Thompson 
of  Chicago,  he  urged  the  City  Council  to  erect  a  monument  to  mark 
the  resting  place  of  the  man  who  first  surveyed  the  site  of  our  city. 
The  council  not  seeing  fit  to  take  any  action,  Mayor  Thompson,  at  his 
own  expense,  erected  the  monument  and  dedicated  it  on  Memorial 
Day,  1917.  Doctor  Otto  L.  Schmidt,  president  of  the  Illinois  His- 
torical Society,  who  presided  on  that  occasion,  referred  to  this  splendid 
act  in  the  following  words:  "In  reopening  these  forgotten  pages  of 
Illinois  history,  Mayor  Thompson  has  done  a  duty  for  the  city  of  which 
he  is  the  chief  official,  a  service  to  the  State,  and  reveals  a  sacred  in- 
terest in  the  past  that  we  hope  will  arouse  the  latent  talents  of  others 
to  emulate  this  public-spirited  and  ideal  act." 

ONLY  SEVEN  WHITE  FAMILIES  OUTSIDE  THE  FORT 

At  the  time  of  the  survey  made  by  James  Thompson  there  were 
only  seven  white  families  here  outside  of  Fort  Dearborn,  but  it  was 
not  long  then  until  settlers  and  speculators  began  pouring  in.  Among 
the  first  to  arrive  was  Stephen  F.  Gale,  the  grandfather  of  William  Hale 
Thompson,  the  present  Mayor  of  Chicago.  The  building  of  the  canal 
attracted  Mr.  Gale's  attention  to  the  locality,  which  he  observed  was 
right  in  the  path  or  route  which  the  coming  commerce  must  take  in 
its  passage  between  the  east  and  the  boundless  regions  of  the  west. 
Of  course,  that  was  in  the  days  of  water-borne  commerce,  but  the  com- 
ing of  the  railroad  has  only  further  confirmed  his  judgment,  because  it 
may  be  noted  even  now  that  practically  all  of  the  transcontinental 
railway  lines  pass  through  or  near  Chicago. 

Mr.  Gale,  whose  early  home  here  was  on  the  southeast  corner  of 
Washington  and  Dearborn  streets,  lived  to  see  Chicago  become  the 
home  of  two  million  people  and  the  greatest  railway  and  transportation 
center  of  the  whole  world. 

He  opened  a  book  store  on  South  Water  street  near  the  corner  of 
Clark  street,  the  first  exclusive  book  store  in  Chicago.  In  addition  to 
contributing  in  this  way  to  the  intellectual  development  of  the  com- 

11 


munity,  he  helped  to  organize  Chicago  as  a  town  (August  10,  1833), 
and  was  one  of  a  total  of  twenty-eight  who  cast  their  votes  five  days 
later  for  the  election  of  four  trustees;  helped  draft  the  first  city  charter 
and  aided  in  the  incorporation  of  Chicago  as  a  city  on  March  4,  1837; 
became  the  first  chief  of  Chicago's  volunteer  fire  department;  and  was 
the  first  president  of  the  Chicago,  Burlington  &  Quincy  Railway  Com- 
pany. 

THE  ILLINOIS  AND  MICHIGAN  CANAL  MADE  CHICAGO 

Various  reasons  are  given  by  different  authorities  for  the  subse- 
quent marvelous  and  unprecedented  growth  of  the  city.  Professor 
John  Fiske,  in  his  history  of  the  United  States,  referring  to  the  inven- 
tion of  the  locomotive,  says:  "Chicago  was  then  (1830)  a  mere  village 
in  the  wilderness,  and  on  the  outskirts  of  civilization.  Along  with  ether 
great  inventors  and  inventions  it  is  especially  to  George  Stevenson  and 
the  railroad  that  Chicago  owes  her  wonderful  growth." 

The  story  of  the  early  development  of  Chicago  is  well  and  briefly 
told  in  the  foot  note  on  page  486  of  the  HISTORY  OF  ILLINOIS  by 
Davidson  and  Stuve,  in  part  as  follows: 

"It  is  a  curious  fact  that  the  early  gro'wth  of  Chicago  was  greatly 
in  accord  with  the  progress  of  the  canal.  The  canal  may  be  said  to 
have  made  Chicago.  When  the  survey  of  the  site  was  commenced  and 
platted,  by  order  of  the  canal  co'mmissioners,  in  1829,  there  resided 
upon  its  site  only  about  a  half  dozen  families  outside  the  palisades  of 
Fort  Dearborn;  but  with  the  prospect  o'f  the  inauguration  of  this  great 
work,  population  began  to  pour  in  freely.  The  Black  Hawk  war  perhaps 
checked  it  a  little  but  with  the  removal  of  the  Indians,  the  tide  of  im- 
migratio'n  was  resumed.  When,  in  1835,  the  first  canal  loan  of 
$500,000  was  authorized,  a  new  impulse  was  given  to  the  settlement 
of  the  town,  and  with  the  additional  legislation  of  January,  1836,  her 
population,  swollen  to  about  4,000,  the  extraordinary  fever  for  specula- 
tion in  town  lots  still  rife,  and  the  actual  commencement  of  the  work, 
we  find  the  prosperity  o'f  that  period  to  culminate.  Shortly  after  came 
the  great  revulsion  of  1837,  which,  with  the  collapse  of  the  visionary 
internal  improvement  system  of  the  State  two  and  a  half  years  later, 
would  have  utterly  pro'strated  Chicago  but  for  the  persistency  with 
which  the  work  on  the  canal  was  sustained.  As  it  was  her  prosperity 
was  checked  materially  for  7  years." 

Actual  work  on  the  canal  was  begun  in    1836. 

THE  YEAR  1837  A  RED  LETTER  ONE  FOR  CHICAGO 

The  year  1837  was  a  red  letter  year  in  the  calendar  of  events  in 
Chicago  and  Illinois.  On  March  4,  1837,  Chicago  was  incorporated 
as  a  city  with  a  population  of  4,149;  in  1837  the  state  capitol  was 
removed  from  Vandalia,  its  second  location,  to  its  third  and  permanent 
location  at  Springfield;  in  1837  Elijah  P.  Lovejoy,  one  of  the  leading 
antislavery  advocates,  was  killed  by  a  mob  in  Alton,  Illinois,  thus 
helping  to  bring  on  the  "irrepressible  conflict"  over  slavery  which  was 
to  baptize  the  nation  in  blood  a  quarter  of  a  century  later;  in  1837 
the  first  railroad  in  the  State  went  into  operation  in  East  St.  Louis, 
with  horses  for  motive  power;  in  1837  the  worst  financial  and  com- 
mercial panic  in  its  history  up  to  that  time  occurred  in  the  United 
States;  and  it  was  in  1837  that  the  Illinois  Legislature  entered  on  a 
vast  program  of  public  improvements  at  state  expense,  which  was 
never  carried  out,  but  which  came  very  near  bankrupting  the  state. 
A  part  of  the  program,  as  laid  out,  was  the  appropriation  of  about 
six  million  dollars  for  the  building  of  railways  to  furnish  the  people  in 
the  interior  needed  transportation  to  the  waterways,  which  were  still 
regarded  as  the  principal  means  of  transportation.  One  of  these  roads 
was  the  Central  Railroad,  (afterward  the  Illinois  Central)  to  be  built 
from  the  junction  of  the  Ohio  and  Mississippi  rivers,  to  the  southern 
terminus  of  the  Illinois  and  Michigan  canal  at  Ottawa,  with  a  branch 

18 


from  there  to  the  lead  mines  at  Galena.  Of  the  whole  program  of 
railroad  construction,  however,  there  were  only  about  25  miles  of  road 
actually  constructed  by  the  state,  and  that  was  on  what  was  called 
the  Northern  Cross  Railroad  from  Meredosia  to  Jacksonville,  on  which 
the  first  locomotive  in  the  Mississippi  valley  was  put  in  operation 
in  1838. 

FIRST  RAILROAD  TOUCHED  CHICAGO  IN   1850 

After  squandering  nearly  1 5  millions  of  dollars,  with  only  a  few 
miles  of  railroad  to  show  for  it,  the  public  improvement  craze  came  to 
an  end  within  three  years  from  the  date  of  its  birth.  The  worst  feature 
of  it  was  the  fact  that  it  retarded  sound  constructive  development  in 
Illinois  for  ten  years,  postponing  for  that  long  the  building  of  needed 
railways.  In  1850,  the  Chicago  &  Galena  Railway  was  finished  as  far 
west  as  Elgin.  That  -was  the  first  line  of  railroad  built  within  the  present 
limits  of  Chicago,  and  is  now  the  main  line  of  the  Chicago  &  North- 
western. 

By  the  year  1848,  the  State  had  progressed  to  such  a  degree  that 
it  had  outgrown  its  first  constitution  and  a  new  one  was  adopted,  the 
principal  provision  of  which  was  a  prohibition  of  any  more  internal 
improvements  at  public  expense.  In  this  year  another  very  important 
event  occurred,  namely,  the  Illinois  and  Michigan  canal  -was  completed, 
and  this  revived  the  demand  for  railway  facilities  through  which  the 
products  of  the  interior  of  the  state  might  be  shipped  to  the  waterways. 
This  demand  finally  resulted  in  the  passage  by  the  Congress  of  the 
United  States,  in  September  1850,  of  an  Act  granting  to  the  State  of 
Illinois  nearly  three  million  acres  of  government  lands  to  aid  in  building 
the  railroad  from  the  junction  of  the  Ohio  and  Mississippi  rivers  to  the 
southern  terminus  of  the  Illinois  and  Michigan  canal.  This  was  the 
first  land  grant  made  by  Congress  to  aid  in  the  building  of  a  railway. 

HOW  THE  ILLINOIS  CENTRAL  ACQUIRED  THE  LAKE  FRONT 

An  arrangement  was  made  by  the  General  Assembly  of  Illinois 
with  a  private  corporation  to  build  the  railroad  and  to  take  over  the 
land,  in  return  for  which  the  corporation  agreed  forever  to  pay  into 
the  state  treasury  seven  per  cent  of  the  gross  income  of  the  railroad 
each  year.  It  was  also  agreed  that  in  addition  to  the  Galena  branch 
that  there  should  be  a  branch  to  Chicago,  although  the  exact  location 
of  the  branch  was  not  included  in  the  Act  passed  by  the  Legislature. 
This  left  it  for  the  railroad  company  to  locate  the  branch  to  suit  its 
convenience,  which  it  did  in. such  a  way  as  to  get  for  the  company  the 
choicest  land  and  as  much  of  it  as  possible. 

The  passage  of  this  Act  by  the  General  Assembly  of  Illinois  on 
February  -10,  1851,  for  the  building  of  the  Illinois  Central  Railway, 
was  celebrated  in  Chicago  with  great  joy  and  public  demonstrations, 
because  it  was  taken  to  mean  that  in  this  way  the  commerce  of  the 
lower  Mississippi  valley  would  come  through  Chicago.  Work  on  the 
Chicago  "branch,"  which  has  since  become  in  fact  the  main  line,  was 
begun  in  the  spring  of  1852,  and  was  rapidly  constructed,  reaching 
Chicago  on  September  26,  1856.  In  this  way  Chicago's  fourth  great 
railway  became  a  reality,  it  having  been  preceded,  as  we  have  seen, 
by  the  Chicago  &  Northwestern  in  1850,  and  by  the  Michigan  Central 
and  the  Lake  Shore  &  Michigan  Southern  in  1852. 

DEVELOPMENT  OF  CHICAGO'S  WATER  SUPPLY 

The  thriving  little  city  now  began  to  take  on  metropolitan  airs,  and, 
as  is  usual  in  the  case  of  growing  communities  which  are  in  the  transi- 
tion period  from  towns  or  villages  to  cities,  the  question  of  a  municipal 

13 


waterworks  system  began  to  be  agitated.  In  the  infancy  of  Chicago, 
the  water  supply  of  its  people  was  procured  from  the  Lake,  either  by 
the  people  going  to  the  shore  and  dipping  it  up  and  carrying  it  to  their 
homes  and  places  of  business,  or,  by  patronizing  some  "waterwagon" 
•which  conducted  a  regular  business  of  hauling  the  water  in  casks  or 
barrels.  Later  the  city  expended  nearly  one  hundred  dollars  to  have 
a  well  dug  over  on  the  north  side  of  the  river,  but  that  did  not  prove 
satisfactory.  The  next  water  service  was  by  a  private  corporation 
called  the  Chicago  Hydraulic  Company,  which  erected  a  tank  25  feet 
square,  8  feet  in  depth,  at  an  elevation  of  about  75  feet  above  the 
ground  at  about  the  intersection  of  Lake  Street  with  Michigan  Avenue. 
The  "mains"  were  logs  bored  out  in  the  middle  and  laid  end  to  end. 
That  constituted  the  water  system  from  1840  to  1854,  when  the  city 
government  took  over  the  private  water  company  and  erected  the 
Chicago  Avenue  pumping  station,  which  yet  remains  at  Chicago  Ave- 
nue and  the  Lake  Shore  Drive  as  one  of  the  landmarks  of  early  Chicago. 
From  that  modest  beginning  the  system  has  grown  by  leaps  and 
bounds,  the  city  being  hard  pressed  at  times  to  keep  pace  with  the 
increasing  area  of  the  city  and  its  constantly  growing  population,  until 
today  the  city  of  Chicago  maintains  ten  mammoth  pumping  stations, 
fed  from  water  tunnels  aggregating  60  miles  in  length  which  take  in 
the  pure  water  from  far  out  in  the  Lake,  beyond  the  zone  of  probable 
infection,  and  conduct  it,  in  volumes  equalling  the  flow  of  good  sized 
rivers,  to  the  "wells"  under  the  stations,  from  where  .it  is  pumped 
through  3,000  miles  of  water  mains,  like  arteries  of  the  human  body, 
into  the  homes  and  buildings  of  Chicago.  Through  this  vast  system, 
there  is  distributed  every  day  to  the  citizens  of  Chicago  800  million 
gallons  of  the  best  and  purest  water  in  the  world — Nature's  bountiful 

gift    to    our   wonderful    city at   a    cost   of   less   per   gallon    than    the    cost 

of  water  distribution  in  any  other  large  city  in  the  world;  and  the 
superiority  of  our  supply  is  shown  in  the  fact  that  there  is  a  lower 
percentage  of  typhoid  fever  a-nd  other  water-borne  diseases  in  Chicago 
than  in  any  other  large  city  in  the  world. 

THE  LINCOLN-DOUGLAS  DEBATES 

In  1858,  the  Republican  party  of  Illinois,  then  in  its  infancy,  nom- 
inated Abraham  Lincoln  as  its  candidate  for  the  United  States  Senate 
against  Senator  Douglas,  whose  term  expired  the  following  March. 
In  accepting  the  nomination  of  the  convention,  Lincoln  delivered  his 
famous  speech  on  the  subject,  "A  House  Divided  Against  Itself  Cannot 
Stand,"  and  in  that  noted  address  he  argued  that  the  nation  could  not 
permanently  endure  half  slave  and  half  free;  that  it  would  eventually 
become  one  or  the  other;  and  that  he  was  for  placing  slavery  in  the 
course  of  ultimate  extinction. 

Chicago  was  the  center  of  the  contest  between  Lincoln  and 
Douglas.  The  latter  actually  lived  in  Washington,  but  he  maintained 
a  nominal  residence  in  Chicago  in  order  to  be  identified  with  the  state 
which  he  represented  in  the  United  States  Senate.  Senator  Douglas 
•was  a  very  able  legislator,  and  did  a  great  deal  for  Chicago  and  the 
State  while  he  represented  it  in  the  Senate.  When  in  Chicago  he  lived 
at  the  old  Tremont  Hotel,  and  it  was  there  one  day,  while  he  was  stand- 
ing in  the  lobby  of  the  hotel,  that  a  note  was  presented  to  him  from 
Abraham  Lincoln  challenging  him  to  a  series  of  debates  on  his  doctrine 
of  popular  sovereignty.  The  joint  debates,  seven  in  all,  were  held  in 
various  towns  throughout  the  state,  from  Freeport  in  the  north  to 
Jonesboro  in  the  south. 

After  the  first  debate,  which  was  held  at  Ottawa,  Lincoln  confided 
to  some  friends  that  he  intended  to  challenge  Senator  Douglas  at  their 
next  debate  in  Freeport,  to  state  whether  the  people  of  a  territory  could 
exclude  slavery  from  its  limits  prior  to  the  formation  of  a  state  con- 

14 


atitution.  Lincoln's  friends  tried  to  dissuade  him  from  asking  the  ques- 
tion, pointing  out  that  Senator  Douglas  would  answer  it  in  the  affirma- 
tive, which  would  result  in  the  defeat  of  Lincoln  for  the  senatorship. 
Lincoln  replied  to  the  effect  that  if  Senator  Douglas  should  make  that 
reply,  it  might  secure  him  re-election  as  Senator  but  that  it  would 
defeat  him  for  President  in  1860.  "1  am  after  larger  game,"  Lincoln 
said.  "The  battle  of  I860  is  worth  a  hundred  of  this."  Douglas  won 
the  senatorship,  but  as  Lincoln  prophesied,  it  cost  him  the  presidency, 
because  the  south  maintained  that  the  institution  of  slavery  was  or- 
dained by  Heaven  and  could  not  be  interferred  with  by  the  Federal 
Government  or  by  any  power  on  earth. 

LINCOLN  NOMINATED  FOR  PRESIDENT  IN  CHICAGO 

The  scene  shifts  back  to  Chicago,  where  the  Republican  National 
Convention  was  called  to  meet  on  June  16,  1860.  Chicago  then  had  a 
population  in  excess  of  1 00,000,  but  there  was  not  a  hall  in  the  city 
large  enough  to  accommodate  the  crowd  which  it  was  anticipated  would 
attend  the  convention.  On  a  vacant  lot  at  the  southeast  corner  of 
Lake  and  Market  Streets,  where  the  old  Sauganash  Inn  had  formerly 
stood,  a  two-story  frame  structure  was  hastily  erected  to  serve  as  the 
Convention  Hall,  and  was  named  "The  Wigwam,"  although  why  it  -was 
so  called  is  not  clear.  The  Convention  met,  adopted  a  party  platform, 
and  on  June  1  8th  took  up  the  question  of  nominating  the  party  candi- 
date for  president.  The  scholarly  William  M.  Evarts  placed  in  nomi- 
nation New  York's  favorite  son,  William  H.  Seward.  He  was  followed 
by  Norman  B.  Judd,  republican  national  committeeman  from  Illinois, 
who  placed  Abraham  Lincoln  in  nomination.  Following  these  were 
other  nominations  including  Salmon  P.  Chase  and  Judge  John  McLean, 
both  of  Ohio,  and  Edward  Bates  of  Missouri.  On  the  third  ballot, 
Lincoln  was  nominated  and  the  citizens  of  Chicago  became  almost 
delirious  with  joy,  celebrating  the  nomination  with  bands,  parades  and 
fireworks. 

DEMOCRATS  NOMINATE  DOUGLAS 

The  Democratic  National  Convention,  held  in  Baltimore  from  June 
18th  to  23d,  nominated  Stephen  A.  Douglas  as  its  candidate  for  Presi- 
dent, but  the  "Freeport  Doctrine"  that  slavery  could  be  excluded  under 
certain  conditions,  announced  by  him  in  answer  to  Lincoln's  question, 
was  so  obnoxious  to  the  south  that  another  national  democratic  con- 
vention was  held  later  at  Charleston,  South  Carolina,  as  a  protest  against 
the  nomination  of  Douglas,  and  this  second,  convention  nominated  John 
C.  Breckenridge,  an  out  and  out  slavery  advocate,  while  still  another 
party  nominated  John  Bell  of  Tennessee.  In  the  election  which  fol- 
lowed, Lincoln  secured  180  electoral  votes,  Breckenridge  72,  Bell  39, 
and  Douglas  1  2. 

Before  Lincoln  was  inaugurated  on  March  4,  1861,  several  of  the 
southern  states  had  served  notice  on  the  world  that  they  had  "seceded" 
from  the  Union,  and  had  defied  the  Federal  Government  to  attempt  to 
exercise  national  authority  within  their  borders.  Senator  Douglas  now 
became  one  of  the  staunch  supporters  of  Lincoln,  and  on  the  floor  of 
the  Senate  vigorously  opposed  the  right  of  a  state  to  secede.  However, 
the  disastrous  end  of  his  ambition  to  become  President  had  left  him 
broken-hearted,  and  he  died  in  Chicago  on  June  3,  1861,  less  than 
three  months  from  the  time  he  had  hoped  to  be  inaugurated  President 
of  the  United  States.  His  remains  lie  buried  in  this  city  in  Dourjla1? 
Square,  just  west  of  the  Illinois  Central  Railroad,  at  the  foot  of  35th 
street;  and  a  noble  monument,  the  funds  for  which  were  secured  through 
public  subscriptions,  was  erected  there  and  dedicated  on  June  3,  1868, 

16 


the  anniversary  of  his  death,  to  the  memory  of  the  "Little  Giant,"  as 
he  was  fondly  called  by  his  supporters  and  political  followers.  It  has 
been  for  fifty  years  one  of  the  landmarks  of  Chicago. 

LINCOLN  "BELONGS  TO  THE  AGES" 

Abraham  Lincoln  was  inaugurated  President  of  the  United  States 
on  March  4th,  1861.  On  April  14th  following,  the  Union  commander 
of  Fort  Sumter  in  the  harbor  at  Charleston,  South  Carolina,  was 
obliged  to  surrender  the  fort  to  a  force  of  rebels  who  had  been  bom- 
barding it  since  the  morning  of  April  1 2th.  From  then  on  for  four 
long  and  weary  years  Lincoln  guided  the  ship  of  state  through  the 
perilous  waters  of  the  most  destructive  war  known  in  history  up  to 
that  time;  a  war  to  determine,  as  Lincoln  said,  "whether  a  nation  con- 
ceived in  liberty  and  dedicated  to  the  proposition  that  all  men  are 
created  equal,  could  long  endure."  When  the  end  of  the  long  and 
terrible  voyage  was  reached,  the  Union  had  been  saved  and  four  million 
human  beings  had  been  released  from  the  bonds  of  slavery;  although 
the  great  Captain  who  had  guided  the  ship  of  state  lay  dead  upon  the 
deck!  On  the  14th  of  April,  1865,  Good  Friday  and  four  years  to  a 
day  from  the  fall  of  Fort  Sumter,  President  Lincoln  was  shot  in  the 
back  of  the  head  while  sitting  in  a  private  box  in  a  theater  in  Wash- 
ington with  a  party  of  friends.  He  died  the  following  morning  at  an 
hour  which  has  since  been  marked  on  the  watch  signs  used  by  jewelers. 
As  he  breathed  his  last,  one  of  his  cabinet  members  devoutly  and 
truthfully  said,  "Now,  he  belongs  to  the  ages." 

LAY  IN  STATE  IN  CHICAGO 

His  great  mission,  for  which  he  had  been  raised  up  by  the  God  of 
Nations,  was  finished,  and,  like  the  prophets  of  old,  he  was  gathered 
unto  his  fathers.  '  As  soon  as  it  was  announced  that  his  body  was  to  be 
taken  back  to  Springfield  for  burial,  it  seemed  that  every  hamlet  be- 
tween Washington  and  Springfield  craved  an  opportunity  to  pay  homage 
to  the  dead  President.  In  order  that  as  many  as  possible  might  do  so, 
it  was  arranged  that  a  special  train  should  leave  Washington  on  April 
21,  to  go  by  way  of  Baltimore,  Philadelphia,  New  York,  Buffalo,  Cleve- 
land, Toledo,  Indianapolis  and  Chicago.  His  secretary,  John  Hay,  in 
his  life  of  Lincoln,  said:  "As  the  train  passed  into  Ohio,  the  crowds 
increased  in  density,  and  the  public  grief  seemed  intensified  at  every 
step  westward."  The  funeral  cortege  reached  Chicago  on  the  morning 
of  May  first,  and  an  imposing  funeral  procession  accompanied  the 
nation's  dead  chief  to  the  County  Building,  which  stood  then  where  the 
combined  City  Hall  and  County  Building  now  stand.  Here  the  body 
lay  in  state  while  thousands  upon  thousands  of  grief-stricken  people 
filed  past  for  a  last  look  at  the  beloved  features  of  the  martyred  Presi- 
dent. The  spirit  of  the  sad  occasion  was  epitomized  in  the  following 
expression  of  sentiment  displayed  near  the  casket:  "Illinois  clasps 
to  her  bosom  her  slain,  but  glorified  son."  The  body  reached  Spring- 
field on  the  morning  of  May  3,  and  was  laid  to  rest  May  4,  in  Oak 
Ridge  Cemetery,  where  the  State  erected  an  imposing  monument,  in 
the  base  of  which  is  a  memorial  hall  where  throngs  of  visitors,  the 
great  and  the  small,  vie  with  each  other  at  that  shrine  of  liberty  in 
paying  homage  to  his  memory. 

CHICAGO  POPULATION  300,000  IN  1870 

The  Federal  Census  of  1870  gave  Chicago  a  population  of  nearly 
300,000.  This  phenomenal  growth  in  the  short  space  of  40  years 
beat  anything  the  world  had  seen  up  to  that  time,  and  it  had  necea- 

II 


sarily  been  so  rapid  that  it  was  not  very  substantial  from  a  material 
standpoint.  Many  of  the  buildings  were  frame  structures  which  had 
been  erected  under  great  stress  to  make  room  for  the  multitudes  con- 
tinually pouring  in.  Even  in  the  decade  of  the  Civil  War,  from  1860 
to  1870,  the  population  had  trebled,  going  from  100,000  to  300,000. 

If  any  citizen  of  Chicago,  reading  his  Sunday  paper  on  October  8, 
1871,  had  paused  to  contemplate  conditions  in  Chicago,  he  would  have 
been  well  pleased  with  the  unprecedented  development  which  had 
occurred.  The  little  town  site  platted  by  James  Thompson,  containing 
less  than  half  a  square  mile  ©f  territory,  had  steadily  grown  until  its 
area  was  in  excess  of  35  square  miles.  On  that  day  it  could  have  been 
said  that  Chicago  was  beyond  the  experimental  stage,  well  on  the  •way 
to  her  destiny  as  one  of  the  great  cities  of  the  world,  if  not  the  greatest. 

NEARLY  DESTROYED  BY  FIRE  OCTOBER  8,   1871 

On  that  Sunday  evening,  a  fire  started  in  a  barn  situated  on  the 
premises  at  the  northeast  corner  of  Jefferson  and  Dekoven  streets,  such 
location  at  that  time  being  practically  the  southwest  corner  of  the 
closely  settled  part  of  the  city.  It  was  such  a  fire  as  under  ordinary 
circumstances  would  have  consumed  only  the  one  or  two  barns  standing 
near  and  would  not  have  excited  any  comment  whatever  in  the  public 
press  the  following  day.  As  it  'was,  however,  there  was  a  steady  gale 
blowing  from  the  southwest  which  fanned  the  flames  and  carried  the 
fire  directly  toward  the  heart  of  the  city.  The  buildings  in  the  path 
of  the  flames,  between  Jefferson  street  and  the  river  a  half  mile  to  the 
east,  were  old  frame  structures  which  burned  like  tinder.  Under  these 
conditions  it  was  not  long  until  the  fire  had  become  a  mighty,  rushing, 
roaring  furnace  which  mocked  the  puny  efforts  of  man  to  stay  it  in 
its  course.  It  crossed  the  river  at  Polk  street,  destroying  the  bridge, 
and  advanced  steadily  toward  the  Chicago  Avenue  Pumping  Station 
as  if  it  realized  that  was  the  only  defense  against  it.  When  the  fire 
had  spent  its  fury  it  was  discovered  that  practically  the  entire  district 
between  12th  street  and  Fullerton  Avenue,  east  of  Clinton  Street,'  to 
the  Lake,  had  been  swept  away.  It  was  estimated  that  250  lives  were 
lost,  17,500  buildings  destroyed,  nearly  100,000  people  were  rendered 
homeless,  and  $200,000,000  worth  of  property  destroyed.  After  the 
first  few  days  following  the  fire,  Chicago  was  under  military  rule,  with 
General  Phil.  Sheridan  in  command,  to  prevent  acts  of  vandalism  and 
lawlessness. 

REBUILDS  AND  PASSES  MILLION  MARK  BY  1890 

It  was  in  this  great  adversity  that  the  famous  "I  WILL"  spirit  of 
Chicago  was  born.  The  tragedy  was  of  such  appalling  magnitude  that 
it  was  seriously  questioned  on  every  hand  whether  the  stricken  city 
could  recover  from  it;  but  the  indomitable  spirit  of  progress  with  which 
the  city  had  been  endowed  by  its  founders  now  asserted  itself  stronger 
than  ever.  Help  came  from  every  quarter,  from  cities  in  this  country 
and  even  from  foreign  lands.  In  all,  these  contributions,  together  with 
the  help  received  from  the  state  of  Illinois,  amounted  to  about 
$10,000,000.  With  this  material  aid  Chicago  again  took  up  her  onward 
march;  by  1880  our  population  had  passed  the  half  million  mark,  and 
in  another  ten  years,  1890,  our  population  again  doubled  itself,  pass- 
ing the  million  mark,  and  taking  rank  as  the  city  second  in  size  on 
this  continent. 

BECOMES  EDUCATIONAL  CENTER  OF  AMERICA 

In  1892,  our  education  system,  which  makes  Chicago  the  center 
of  higher  learning  in  America,  attained  its  culmination  in  the  opening 

17 


of  the  University  of  Chicago,  a  most  important  landmark  of  the  city, 
which  occupies  a  beautiful  site  along  the  Midway  Plaisance,  between 
Washington  Park  and  Jackson  Park.  Chicago  is  the  leading  center  of 
higher  education  in  America,  according  to  the  report  of  the  United 
States  Commissioner  of  Education  for  1920-21,  which  shows  that 
Chicago  has  six  colleges  or  universities,  nine  theological  schools,  eight 
law  schools,  six  medical  schools  and  three  dental  schools,  a  total  of 
thirty-two  institutions,  or  three  more  than  any  other  city  of  the  United 
States. 

The  first  organized  public  school  was  built  in  1845  on  Madison 
street,  on  the  present  site  of  the  Boston  store.  The  building  had  , 
eight  rooms  and  a  total  enrollment  of  915.  The  first  public  high 
school,  called  the  Central  High  School,  was  erected  in  1856  at  the 
corner  of  Monroe  and  Halsted  streets,  showing  the  tendency  of  the 
city  at  that  time  to  develop  toward  the  west.  There  is  a  wealth  of 
material  in  the  subject  of  our  public  schools;  enough,  in  fact,  to  make 
a  comprehensive  history  in  itself.  It  must  suffice,  however,  to  record 
the  fact  that  from  the  beginning  just  described  our  public  school  system 
has  grown  to  be  the  best  in  the  country,  maintaining  at  present  25 
high  schools,  in  which  1,688  teachers  instruct  50,548  pupils;  and  267 
grade  schools  with  90  branches  in  which  8,539  teachers  instruct  317,980 
pupils.  In  all,  there  are  10,227  teachers,  who  are  paid  $20,435,522.61 
per  year  for  their  services;  and  the  little  8-room  building  on  Madison 
street,  which  was  opposed  by  shortsighted  citizens  as  a  waste  of  public 
funds,  has  been  added  to  until  the  real  estate  owned  by  the  Board  of 
Education  of  Chicago  is  valued  at  more  than  one  hundred  million 
dollars. 

In  addition  to  the  regular  day  schools,  conducted  for  ten  months 
out  of  each  year,  the  Board  maintains  evening  classes  in  many  of 
the  schools,  and  daytime  classes  in  large  factories  throughout  the  city 
for  the  special  purpose  of  furnishing  elementary  instruction  to  a  large 
class  of  growing  citizens  who  would  not  otherwise  be  able  to  secure 
the  fundamentals  of  an  education.  When  it  is  realized  that  a  majority 
of  the  children  of  school  age  in  Chicago  are  of  foreign  parentage,  it 
will  be  seen  what  a  comprehensive  and  practical  work  of  Americani- 
zation is  being  done  in  our  schools.  President  Edwin  S.  Davis  of  the 
Board  of  Education  has  truthfully  said  that  the  public  schools  of  Chicago 
constitute  a  vast  melting-pot  in  which  law-abiding  and  patriotic  Amer- 
ican citizens  are  being  made. 

HOME  OF  WORLD'S  COLUMBIAN  EXPOSITION 

In  1876,  the  one  hundredth  anniversary  of  the  nation's  independ- 
ence was  celebrated  by  an  international  exhibition  called  the  Centen- 
nial Exposition  in  Philadelphia,  where  the  Declaration  of  Independence 
was  originally  promulgated.  It  -was  financed  jointly  by  the  City  of 
Philadelphia,  the  State  of  Pennsylvania  and  the  United  States.  The 
Exposition  was  a  decided  success,  many  foreign  countries  being  repre- 
sented by  exhibits,  and  with  a  total  attendance  of  eight  million  persons. 
This  success  suggested  the  idea  of  holding  a  larger  exposition  in  1892 
to  commemorate  the  discovery  of  America  by  Columbus  in  1492,  and 
at  once  a  keen  rivalry  developed  among  New  York,  Washington,  St. 
Louis,  and  Chicago  for  the  location.  The  "I  Will'  spirit  which  had 
raised  our  wonder  city  from  the  ashes  of  its  great  fire  again  asserted 
itself,  with  the  result  that  in  February,  1890,  Congress  authorized  the 
holding  of  the  exposition  and  designated  Chicago  as  the  place. 

The  site  selected  for  its  location  was  Jackson  Park  on  the  shore  of 
Lake  Michigan,  and  the  Midway  Plaisance,  the  latter  consisting  of  a 
strip  of  land  a  block  in  width  between  59th  and  60th  streets  and 
extending  one  mile  from  Washington  Park  to  Jackson  Park,  the  entire 


area  of  the  park  and  the  Plaisance  being  633  acres.  In  December, 
1890,  President  Benjamin  Harrison  issued  an  international  proclama- 
tion in  'which  he  invited  "all  nations  of  the  earth  to  take  part  in  the 
commemoration  of  an  event  that  is  pre-eminent  in  human  history  and 
of  lasting  interest  to  mankind."  In  response  to  this  invitation  52 
foreign  powers  officially  participated,  besides  practically  every  state 
and  territory  in  the  union. 

The  main  buildings  of  the  exposition  covered  nearly  150  acres  of 
land,  and  in  addition  to  these  many  foreign  governments  and  nearly 
every  state  in  the  union  erected  buildings  for  the  use  of  their  respective 
citizens  during  their  visits  to  the  exposition.  The  Manufacturers  and 
Liberal  Arts  Building  was  the  largest  enclosed  structure  in  the  world, 
covering  more  than  thirty  acres  of  ground.  The  Central  Hall,  l,280x 
380  feet,  was  open  to  the  roof,  a  distance  of  237.6  feet,  without  a 
supporting  column.  There  were  eleven  acres  of  skylight  and  forty 
carloads  of  glass  in  the  roof.  It  required  7,000,000  feet  of  lumber 
and  five  carloads  of  nails  to  lay  the  floor.  All  the  main  buildings  of 
the  exposition,  save  the  Art  Palace,  were  of  frame  and  stucco  con- 
struction covered  with  a  composition  resembling  marble,  and  all  painted 
a  dazzling  white. 

SOME  LANDMARKS  STILL  REMAIN  IN  JACKSON  PARK 

If  those  who  did  not  have  the  great  privilege  of  seeing  the  Fair 
•would  like  to  gain  an  idea  of  the  vastness  of  that  most  wonderful  of 
all  expositions,  they  should  take  a  trip  to  Jackson  Park  where  they  may 
observe,  still  standing  in  its  lonely  grandeur,  the  Art  Palace  of  the 
Exposition,  a  substantial  brick  structure  in  which  was  collected  and 
exhibited  the  products  of  the  genius  of  man  throughout  the  centuries 
that  had  gone  before.  The  present  owes  it  to  the  past  to  restore  the 
old  building  to  its  pristine  glory,  to  stand  as  a  permanent  landmark  of 
our  past  glories  and  as  a  monument  to  the  great  "1  will"  spirit  of  the 
people  that  could  produce  an  exhibition  of  its  unprecedented  grandeur. 

The  setting  of  the  great  exposition  was  beautiful  beyond  compre- 
hension; by  day  the  sharp  contrast  between  the  deep  blue  of  the  lake 
and  the  dazzling  white  of  the  stately  buildings  made  a  picture  which 
will  never  fade  in  the  memory  of  those  who  saw  it;  and  by  night  the 
place  was  a  veritable  fairyland,  millions  of  electric  bulbs  glowing  on 
the  buidings,  the  Macmonnies  electric  fountain  playing  in  the  lagoon 
just  south  of  the  Art  Palace,  gondoliers  propelling  their  graceful  craft 
in  and  out  of  the  network  of  lagoons  and  canals,  and  music  coming 
from  many  directions.  If  one  wanted  to  see  the  -world  at  a  glance,  it 
•was  only  necessary  to  take  a  trip  down  the  Midway  where  one  could 
drop  into  Old  Vienna,  an  Irish  village,  the  German  village,  the  Streets 
of  Cairo,  a  Hottentot  village,  the  igloos  of  the  Eskimo  or  the  thatched 
huts  of  the  South  Sea  Islanders,  around  which  the  natives  squatted  on 
their  haunches,  having  a  little  lunch  of  raw  meat. 

OVER  TWENTY-SEVEN  MILLION  PAID  ADMISSIONS 

The  great  fair,  called  the  World's  Columbian  Exposition,  was  a  joint 
venture  on  the  part  of  th*  government  of  the  United  States,  the  State 
of  Illinois  and  the  City  of  Chicago.  There  were  more  than  65,000 
exhibitors  and  twenty-seven  and  one-half  million  paid  admissions.  The 
total  expenditures  of  operation  were  approximately  $  I  2,000,000,  and  the 
total  receipts  approximately  $14,000,000.  The  gates  of  the  Exposition 
opened  to  the  public  May  I,  1893,  were  closed  October  30,  the  same 
year,  and  the  great  "White  City"  of  reality  became  the  "Dream  City"  to 
those  who  had  seen  it.  After  the  close  of  the  exposition  many  of  the 
main  buildings  burned,  and  most  of  the  others  were  wrecked  and 

19 


removed.  Of  all  the  buildings  which  stood  on  the  ground  during  the 
exposition,  the  only  ones  that  now  remain  are  the  Art  Palace,  a  replica 
of  the  Convent  of  LaRabida,  and  the  German  Building,  which  was 
presented  to  the  City  of  Chicago  by  Germany,  in  token  of  her  friend- 
ship and  good  will,  at  the  close  of  the  exposition. 


Among  the  many  questions  presented  by  Chicago's  wonderful 
development,  and  which  at  times  taxed  the  "1  Will"  spirit  of  Chicago 
to  the  utmost  of  its  power  and  genius,  was  a  very  grave  one  touching 
the  health  and  the  lives  of  the  million  people  then  here,  and  that  was 
the  question  of  separating  our  sewage  from  our  drinking  water.  Since 
the  establishment  of  the  city,  its  sewerage  had  been  emptied  into  the 
Chicago  river,  which  was  little  more  than  an  arm  of  the  Lake,  with  no 
current  save  when  heavy  rain  on  the  Chicago  plateau  would  move  its 
stagnant  and  odorous  contents  out  into  the  Lake,  there  to  find  its  way 
in  a  diluted  form  into  our  water  supply.  Doctor  Lyman  E.  Cooley, 
an  engineer  of  international  reputation  and  one  of  the  most  profound 
students  of  his  time  on  drainage  questions,  who  had  been  Professor  of 
History  in  Northwestern  University,  hit  upon  the  seemingly  simple 
expedient  of  reversing  the  flow  of  the  Chicago  river,  and,  by  making 
it  "go  up  hill,"  cause  it  to  follow  the  course  it  did  in  former  ages  when 
it  served  as  a  spillway  for  the  Lake  into  the  Illinois  river. 

TURNING  CHICAGO  RIVER  "UP-STREAM" 

Under  an  Act  of  the  Illinois  General  Assembly,  approved  May  29, 
1889,  the  Chicago  Sanitary  District  was  organized  and  a  canal  known 
as  the  Chicago  Drainage  Canal  was  constructed  from  a  point  on  the 
Chicago  river,  at  about  the  location  of  the  cabin  built  for  Father  Mar- 
quette,  to  the  DesPlaines  river  at  Lockport,  a  distance  of  28.05  miles. 
Through  the  rock  formation  of  the  summit  of  the  elevation  between 
the  Lake  and  the  DesPlaines  river,  the  canal  was  made  1  60  feet  wide, 
with  practically  perpendicular  sides,  while  in  that  portion  of  the  canal 
running  through  soil  formation,  the  canal  was  made  from  100  to  200 
feet  wide  on  the  bottom,  and  from  200  to  300  feet  wide  at  the  top. 
The  work  was  begun  in  1892,  and  the  canal,  the  greatest  monument  to 
the  progress  of  Chicago,  was  formally  opened  January  2,  1900. 

The  construction  of  the  main  drainage  channel  removed  only  the 
imminent  menace  to  the  health  of  the  people  of  Chicago,  because  the 
sewers  of  Evanston  and  of  other  cities  and  villages  immediately  north  of 
us,  still  emptied  directly  into  the  Lake,  and  the  great  industrial  district 
in  the  southern  portion  of  the  city,  known  as  the  Calumet  region,  still 
emptied  its  sewerage  into  the  Lake  through  the  Calumet  river.  The 
northern  menace  has  been  largely  removed  by  the  construction  of  a 
canal  from  Wilmette  to  the  north  branch  of  the  Chicago  river,  and  the 
southern  menace  will  be  removed  through  reversing  the  flow  of  the 
Calumet  river  so  that  it  will  discharge  its  contents  into  the  Drainage 
Canal  through  the  Calumet-Sag  channel  now  almost  completed  from 
Blue  Island  to  the  Sag  bridge  on  the  main  Canal.  With  these  engin- 
eering works  in  operation,  Chicago  will  have  the  best  and  purest 
water  supply  in  the  world. 

WILLIAM  HALE  THOMPSON  ENTERS  PUBLIC  LIFE 

In  1902,  an  event  occurred  in  Chicago  which,  while  not  deemed  of 
great  importance  at  the  time,  has  since  proved  to  be  one  of  the  impor- 
tant elements  in  the  life  of  our  great  city.  A  young  man  of  the  name  of 
William  Hale  Thompson  was  elected  to  the  Chicago  City  Council  from 

20 


lending  en  M<?  tT/ffK?  <Jtree(  tridc/e  in    /92S.. 
and  ioo£ing'  en^rf,  M<J  picture  would gi-eet 
T!/\£  et/e  cAfon>  t/\e.  C/dcaq?o  7?i^>-  fas  6?en  maife 
to  run  up  full  J'o  to  <spea£,  and  o  *r/i-ong  cur- 
rent -mn<r  /rorn  t/le   £a£e    {Ai-ov<jf>  tfie    rtt-ei- 
to  t&e.  Drain  exfe  Canat,  and  on.  dotvn  //e  Ttl- 

j     ino(J  ana  ^Mississippi  rivers  tt>  t|u?  ffulf  of. 

K       <iS£etico.  r^ab^ing  //&  cjrcam  of  /Xe  ear/i/ 
TrericA    eyplcrei-j-  and  Voyage  cr-j. 


the  old  Second  Ward.  As  his  name  indicated,  he  was  descended  from 
Revolutionary  stock,  his  greatgrandfather,  Ebenezer  Thompson,  having 
been  proscribed  by  Great  Britain  and  a  price  placed  on  his  head  be- 
cause he  was  regarded  as  one  of  the  leaders  of  the  movement  for  the 
independence  of  the  colonies,  and  for  the  liberty  and  freedom  of  the 
people  here.  It  was  known  to  the  old  settlers  that  he  was  the  favorite 
grandson  of  Stephen  F.  Gale,  mentioned  heretofore;  that  his  mother, 
the  daughter  of  Stephen  F.  Gale,  was  born  in  the  Gale  home  just  one 
block  distant  from  the  present  City  Hall;  and  that  it  was  his  grand  uncle, 
Theophilus  W.  Smith,  who  was  the  author  of  the  bill  in  the  Illinois  Legis- 
lature in  1825,  the  passage  of  which  resulted  in  the  creation  of  the 
Illinois  and  Michigan  Canal;  it  was  known  to  the  veterans  of  the  Civil 
War  and  to  those  of  the  preceding  generation  that  his  father,  William 
Hale  Thompson,  had  served  as  Lieutenant  Commander  on  the  flagship 
of  Admiral  Farragut,  and  had  fought  with  that  old  seadog  in  every  battle 
in  which  Farragut  fought  during  the  Civil  War  in  order  to  save  the  free 
government  established  by  their  forefathers;  and  they  recalled  that 
Thompson,  senior,  had  given  proof  of  his  patriotism  by  making  a  •will 
when  he  went  into  his  country's  service,  leaving  his  property  to  his  gov- 
ernment in  case  of  his  death,  he  at  that  time  having  no  one  dependent 
upon  him.  Business  men  of  that  time  remembered  Thompson,  senior, 
as  a  capable  business  man  and  the  founder  of  the  real  estate  business  on 
the  great  west  side  which  still  bears  his  name.  Friends  of  the  family  like 
Commodore  Ferdinand  W.  Peck  of  World's  Fair  fame,  and  David  W.  Clark, 
long  identified  -with  the  development  of  the  west  side,  remembered  Thomp- 
son, junior,  as  a  boy  with  a  lot  of  "pep"  who  voluntarily  left  the  com- 
forts of  a  home  of  wealth  and  refinement  when  sixteen  years  old  to 
take  up  the  rigorous  life  of  a  cowboy  on  trie  western  cattle  ranges. 
They  recalled  that  the  death  of  his  father  brought  him  back  to  Chicago, 
in  robust  young  manhood  and  a  successful  cattleman  with  an  inde- 
pendent fortune,  to  look  after  his  father's  estate  for  his  widowed  mother. 
Brimming  over  with  health  and  strength  himself,  he  wanted  the  people 
of  his  home  city  to  enjoy  the  same  blessing,  and  at  once  became  the 
patron  and  apostle  of  healthful  outdoor  recreation  and  sports. 

STARTS  MOVE  FOR  MUNICIPAL  PLAYGROUNDS 

He  had  not  been  in  the  Council  long  when  he  introduced  an  ordi- 
nance for  the  establishment  of  a  municipal  playground  for  children  to 
be  located  at  24th  street  and  Wabash  avenue  for  the  use  of  the  chil- 
dren of  that  densely  populated  district.  The  idea  was  a  new  one. 
Aldermen  were  accustomed  to  being  asked  for  public  money  for  almost 
every  conceivable  purpose,  but  they  had  never  seen  anybody  with  the 
audacity  to  ask  for  public  funds  to  establish  a  PLAYGROUND.  It  was 
difficult  for  the  young  man  to  get  .anyone  to  consider  the  proposition 
seriously,  but  he  KNEW  that  he  was  right,  and  so  he  persisted.  He 
invited  attention  to  the  fact  that  there  •were  then  in  the  county  jail 
many  boys  under  the  age  of  2  1  awaiting  trial  for  murder,  and  argued 
that  if  those  boys  had  been  brought  up  in  the  wholesome  surroundings  of 
a  playground  with  the  resulting  healthful  physical  and  moral  stimula- 
tion instead  of  in  alleys  or  dens  of  iniquity,  that  most  of  them  might 
have  turned  out  to  be  useful  citizens  rather  than  outlaws.  In  his  en- 
thusiasm, he  predicted  that  the  playground,  if  established,  would  become 
a  pattern,  not  only  for  Chicago  but  for  densely  populated  communties 
everywhere. 

Accordingly,  an  appropriation  of  $1,200  was  voted  by  the  Coun- 
cil, more  as  a  tribute  to  the  persistence  and  sincerity  of  the  young 
Alderman  than  a  belief  in  his  project.  The  playground,  which  should 
be  set  down  as  one  of  the  important  landmarks  of  Chicago,  was 
established  at  the  corner  of  Wabash  Avenue  and  24th  Street,  and 

22 


became  an  instant  success.  Other  communities  came  in  with  requests 
for  playgrounds,  until  now,  no  appropriation  made  by  the  City  Council 
is  more  popular  than  the  appropriations  for  playgrounds. 

CHICAGO  LEADS  THE  WORLD 

They  have  become  a  feature  of  municipal  life,  not  only  in  Chicago, 
but  throughout  the  United  States,  and  have  been  adopted  throughout 
the  civilized  world.  There  are  72  small  parks  and  15  playgrounds 
under  the  jurisdiction  of  the  city,  and  58  playgrounds  under  jurisdiction 
of  the  Board  of  Education.  In  addition  to  these  the  State,  under  dif- 
ferent agencies,  has  jurisdiction  over  9  large  parks  and  65  small  parks. 
The  total  area  of  these  parks  and  playgrounds  is  3569  acres. 

The  average  daily  attendance  at  the  playgrounds  is  around  150,000. 
In  summer,  1 9  bathing  beaches  offer  recreation  and  comfort,  while  in 
the  winter  season,  hundreds  of  skating  ponds,  improvised  in  every  part 
of  the  city,  give  opportunity  for  the  great  winter  ice  sport.  The  pre- 
liminary training  the  youth  of  Chicago  have  had  on  these  ponds  enabled 
them  to  win  two  consecutive  championships  in  1921  and  1922  in  the 
intercity  contests  in  which  the  large  northern  cities  were  represented. 

PROMOTER  OF  PLAY  GROUNDS  ELECTED  MAYOR 

The  man  who  established  the  first  playground,  the  "Father  of  the 
Municipal  Playground  for  Children"  has  been  twice  elected  Mayor  of 
the  City,  which  shows  that  the  people  discriminate  in  the  choice 
of  public  officials  when  they  are  interested.  It  was  Mayor  Thompson's 
ambition  to  do  something  big  and  constructive  in  the  upbuilding  of 
Chicago,  with  whose  progress  his  grandfather,  his  grand  uncle,  his 
father  and  himself  had  been  so  intimately  associated  since  the  very  birth 
of  the  city,  that  led  him  into  public  life;  and  it  must  now  be  a  source  of 
gratification  to  him  that  during  his  administration  as  Mayor  there  has 
been  more  constructive  development  of  the  city  than  in  all  its  previous 
history,  both  from  the  material  side  in  the  way  of  remarkable  physical 
improvements,  such  as  the  widening  of  1  2th  street  and  the  building  of 
the  boulevard  link,  shown  on  the  cover  of  this  booklet,  and  also  from  the 
moral  side  through  a  great  awakening  and  encouragement  of  the  spirit 
of  civic  righteousness.  There  are  those  who,  for  political  reasons  or 
personal  spite,  endeavor  to  minimize  or  detract  from  this  record,  but  the 
facts  are  recorded  in  deeds  which  words  can  not  efface,  and  which  are 
easily  accessible  to  the  seeker  after  truth. 

The  following  are  a  few  of  the  many  constructive  achievements  of 
the  administration  of  Mayor  Thompson:  the  peaceful  settlement  of  the 
great  labor  strikes  of  1915  without  the  destruction  of  a  dollar  in  prop- 
erty or  the  shedding  of  a  single  drop  of  blood;  the  building  of  the 
"Boulevard  Link"  and  the  Michigan  Avenue  Bridge  shown  on  the  front 
cover;  the  widening  of  12th  Street  (Roosevelt  Road),  through  which 
improvements  property  values  in  their  vicinity  were  increased  hundreds 
of  millions  of  dollars;  the  relief  of  the  families  of  victims  of  the  steam- 
ship Eastland  disaster,  through  the  collection  and  disbursement  in  sixty 
days  of  $375,000,  at  an  expense  of  administration  of  only  $500,  one- 
seventh  of  one  per  cent;  the  inauguration  of  health  measures,  such  as 
the  purification  of  the  water  and  milk  supplies,  -which  have  made  Chi- 
cago the  healthiest  large  city  of  the  world,  having  the  lowest  death  rate 
of  any,  practically  free  from  typhoid  fever  and  other  water-borne  dis- 
eases, while  deaths  from  tuberculosis  have  been  reduced  from  1 2  per 
day  to  6  per  day,  and  the  deaths  of  babies  under  one  year  from  one 
out  of  every  seven  to  one  out  of  twelve;  the  establishment  of  the  Chicago 
Training  School  for  Home  Nurses,  in  which  ten  thousand  women  have 
been  instructed  in  the  fundamentals  of  looking  after  the  sick,  thereby 

23 


preparing  for  any  epidemic  or  emergency;  the  establishment  of  the 
Pageant  of  Progress  Exposition  as  an  annual  event,  conceived  by  the 
Mayor  to  stimulate  business  and  thereby  relieve  unemployment;  the 
extension  of  our  system  of  bathing  beaches  and  the  increased  oppor- 
tunities for  summer  recreation  which  has  made  Chicago  one  of  the 
most  desirable  summer  resorts  in  America;  the  creation  of  600  tem- 
porary ponds  in  the  winter  season  to  provide  opportunity  for  our  great 
winter  sport,  ice  skating;  the  protection  of  the  people  of  Chicago  in 
the  enjoyment  of  their  rights  and  liberties  guaranteed  in  the  Constitu- 
tion of  the  United  States,  including  free  speech  and  peaceful  assembly; 
the  annual  outings  of  the  school  children  of  Chicago  for  wholesome 
recreation  and  education,  attended  by  more  than  half  a  million  children 
last  year,  and  distributing  to  them,  to  take  to  their  homes,  copies  of 
the  United  States  Constitution,  the  Farewell  Address  of  President  George 
Washington,  and  a  History  of  Illinois  featuring  the  life  of  Abraham 
Lincoln — these  are  a  few  of  the  many  things  which  have  made  the 
Thompson  administration  memorable! 

CHICAGO— THE  WONDER  CITY  OF  THE  WORLD 

Chicago  is  too  big  and  the  task  too  great  to  enumerate  all  the 
things  which  make  for  her  greatness.  We  are  the  rail-way  and  com- 
mercial center  of  the  United  States,  and,  as  Mayor  Thompson  points 
out,  our  geographical  situation  at  the  head  of  the  world's  granary  in 
the  Mississippi  valley  gives  us  that  preeminence,  so  nothing  can  take  it 
from  us.  Lake  Michigan  assures  us  a  continuous  and  inexhaustible 
supply  of  the  best  and  purest  water  of  any  big  city  in  the  world.  This, 
with  our  wonderfully  invigorating  climate,  makes  Chicago  the  healthi- 
est large  city  in  the  world.  Our  industrial  supremacy  is  assured  by 
these  conditions  and  the  further  fact  that  practically  at  our  back  door 
lays  the  greatest  available  supply  of  bituminous  coal  in  the  world.  It 
seems,  in  fact,  that  there  has  been  a  joint  effort  on  the  part  of  the  great 
forces  of  nature  to  make  this  the  ideal  spot  for  a  great  city. 

After  all,  what  is  it  that  makes  a  city  great?  Is  it  not  people,  men 
and  women  of  flesh  and  blood,  that  really  make  a  city,  rather  than  its 
streets,  its  buildings,  and  its  material  wealth?  Therefore  let  the  past 
tell  its  story  and  the  present  be  judged,  and  it  will  be  found  that  inas- 
much as  "by  their  works  ye  shall  know  them,"  by  the  same  token  our 
wonder  city  is  greater  even  than  it  seems  to  be. 

.  Let  all  of  us  strive  to  do  our  part  to  make  it  ever  greater! 


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